Corbis Announces 2006 Results

Corbis (www.corbis.com) has announced that its total revenues for 2006 were more than $251 million, up a little over 10% from the $228 million in reported at the end of 2005. The company's growth was almost exactly the same as that of Getty although very slightly higher by a few hundredths of a percentage point.

Like Getty (See Story 921), the company's revenue flattened out in the second half of 2006 after a very good first half (See Story 871). In the second half revenues were down slightly from the first half. Revenue comparisons in millions of dollars of the two companies for each six-month period over the last two years are as follows. Also shown are the percentage of growth or decline from the previous six-months.

1H 2005

2H 2005

% Growth

1H 2006

% Growth

2H 2006

% Decline

Corbis

$111.6

$116.4

4.3%

$127

9.1%

$124

-2.3%

Getty Images

$363.4

$370.3

1%

$405.7

9.6%

$401.6

-1%

Corbis also announced that it will launch an innovative entry into the emerging microstock space in the second quarter of 2007, but they provided no further details at this time.

"2006 was a significant year for Corbis as we began reaping the benefits of past strategic investments to exceed our cash flow targets and stay on plan toward achieving profitability," said Steve Davis, CEO, Corbis. "Our continued industry-leading momentum demonstrates that customers are increasingly recognizing Corbis as a creative brand, responding to our market positioning and benefiting from our innovative combination of image licensing and creative services."

According to Photo District News Corbis earns 88% of its revenue from image licensing. This should be compared to 90% in the first half of 2006 and 91% for 2005. This indicates a slow, but steady, move toward expanding their other lines of business such as rights clearance services.

Corbis' average price for an RM image was $236 and the average price for a RF image was $212.

2006 Business Highlights

In 2006, Corbis expanded its geographic reach, particularly in Asia, with the opening of an office in Beijing and a new partnership with IndiaPicture.com to better position itself in two of the world's fastest growing economies. Corbis also acquired Australian Picture Library (APL) to expand its presence in Australia.

Over the past year, the company promoted Gary Shenk to the role of president and completed the realignment of its sales force to customer-focused industry segments. Corbis also continued to streamline its business operation and integrate systems from past acquisitions to reduce business costs, drive efficiencies, scale for future growth and improve its website and customer service.

During the year the company added nearly a half million new images and thousands of hours of motion footage to its collections. Corbis began representing content from leading collections such as Playboy, the Smithsonian Institution, Hollywood Licensing, dick clark productions as well as key niche partners, and it acquired BeateWorks to enhance its preeminent CorbisOutline entertainment collection.

The Company also invested heavily in the production of wholly owned Rights Managed (RM) and Royalty-Free (RF) imagery and motion footage.

"We are optimistic about the year ahead and are focused on three growth priorities: building the best pictures period, enhancing our industry-leading Rights Services and launching a fresh microstock offering," said Gary Shenk, President, Corbis. "We're excited to enter the microstock space, and we view it as an attractive, complementary business given our assets and expertise. We plan on building a substantial, fast-growing and profitable business in this category."

Jim Pickerell is founder of www.selling-stock.com, an online newsletter that publishes daily. He is also available for personal telephone consultations on pricing and other matters related to stock photography. He occasionally acts as an expert witness on matters related to stock photography. For his current curriculum vitae go to: http://www.jimpickerell.com/Curriculum-Vitae.aspx.

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